raffaele Mastrovincenzo

Last week I went to visit the most underground producer of Etna; Mr. Cornelissen. We met at the church of Passopisciaro in the afternoon, with us there were other couples from NY and Italy. Soon we went in the new temporary winery build in two floor, on the ground floor there is the aging, upstair is use for the vinification. Frank dreaming in a proper winery in tree floor with an underground cellar with natural constant temperature, currently need use air-con to be able to monitor-ate the ambience. He reckon this new winery will be ready in 10 years. As soon we came into the winery I notice a certain amazing hygiene, the cellar was super clean and while Frank show as and explain the steps of the vinification I understood how is important from him to keep the ambience quite sterilized. Here there is only ambience yeast and nothing is added to the wines. Plastic bucket in reasonable size are used for fermentation. Thus the perfect material as Frank reckon for the aging is th

MONTALCINO VIEW  Montalcino a great town in Tuscany in the provence of Siena, people all over the world know this small village for their incredible wine made with Sangiovese actually a particular clone called Sangiovese Grosso; due to the fact of concentration of terpene and flavonoid and small black berries a bit different of the other type of Sangiovese. Some producer made this wine travel in the old days all over the world and gave it a strong personality, Biondi Santi perhaps is the father of it. On my small trip in Montalcino I did try to understand why it is so good, I visit many wineries and I choose them in regards to their way to work the soil and the attention on mother nature which belong to my philosophy of drinking.. I need to drink something which I can put a face of a person behind it, thus means company and big corporation even if their wines are amazing, they don't attract me. I always loved the growers and family businesses. I'll not pretend to sa